125 patrons and halfway to the next goal wonderful, thank you so much to all of you!!

Here comes something that have been on my to do list for a long time, a proper Spread Map Kit. This is a layered PSD file with masks and color layers that you can use to create all sorts of spread maps for things like political, trade, religion or historical maps.

The file comes in two sizes 8300 pixels for a bit more detail and a smaller one at 300 pixels to be usable with tools with Realm Works. It is fully layered which means you can show or hide all the text and symbols, and it comes with a parchment layer and a number of color layers and a set of masks for coastlines. 

One thing to keep in mind - these are low resolution bitmap versions of the Flanaess Map. That means that small text will NOT be legible, and that comes with making a small bitmap version that makes it easy to paint in colors. I just needed to state that here as a clarification.

Text and symbols are layer separated so you can turn each category on or off as needed. Layers are are stacked and blended ready to function with a number of different styles of maps. 

If you need more color layers just create more in the Spread Color group. The Spread Color Group also has its own mask that is set to cover land areas, but by inverting this mask you can cover oceans and lakes. If you want to have a set of spreads for land and another for water areas (or something else) copy the group and give it an appropriate mask.

The PSD file works in GIMP, and in other image editors able to use PSD (Photoshop) files. 

You can also apply layer effects to tweak things to your liking. For example: making the white roads visible on the white spread map background by giving them a purple Color Overlay.

Or you can reduce the saturation of the terrain map to make the spread colors pop a bit more.

All in all I think every Game Master will need some spread maps sooner for his or her campaign and with a setup like this its not that much work to create something that will look stunning, and all you need are some very basic skills in Photoshop, GIMP or your image editor of choice. Always remember to not save over the original when you make a new new version.

This is also the debut for the 2018 Edition Terrain. There is still a lot of details that needs work, but for this low resolution (and crappy low resolution) need it is already good enough.

You can grab the 8300 pixel version here:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/c37x8kx3pn85joy/Spread%20Map%202017-8300px.psd?dl=0

and the 3000 pixel version here:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/vhuuvzuspgiqfjn/Spread%20Map%202017-3000px.psd?dl=0

I'm leaving for Gen Con in a week and there are a ton of things that needs to be in place before I leave, and World Machine videos are an important part of it and here is the first one.

It covers Extents, the area of interest in world Machine. The sound is low for a part of the video for some reason, I'm sorry for that , but I hope it will work.

More videos are in production, and I've turned off my phone, logged out of all social media and generally turned myself into a recluse for a few days getting this done.

The next video will be WM Export Setup.

For those of you who use Illustrator here are the links to my "Master Maps":

The Flanaess 2017 Edition:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/fyeszktisrg8bbk/Flanaess%20Full%20Map%202017%20Edition.ai?dl=0

My Campaign Map:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/e62w5wvr1ad0yq9/Flanaess%20Campaign%20map180707.ai?dl=0

Here you can get the linked map images:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/w2xghgxraei34gp/Full%20map%20background%20200ppi%20hex.jpg?dl=0

https://www.dropbox.com/s/y2jsf5z5nxdb409/Full%20map%20background%20200ppi%20no%20frills.jpg?dl=0

https://www.dropbox.com/s/3kvf2twkmpghcwl/Full%20map%20background%20200ppi%20w%20Frills.jpg?dl=0

https://www.dropbox.com/s/apkrrv9weu3sajq/Full%20map%20background%20200ppi%20w%20hex%20public.jpg?dl=0

There are hexed and non hexed versions as well as with and without the legend backgrounds.

Almost all text is converted to outlines in order to make the maps more manageable, but you will still need quite powerful machine to work with them. In order to get the fonts you can scroll back to my older post and you will find a post about that. 

I never created a symbols for walls, great walls seem to be a rarity in the Flanaess. But in my campaign Iuz is up to things so I had to come up with a way to show them on the map. Here is a first version.  

Now the 12 mile hexed version is available as well as the normal version on EasyZoom.

The Hexed version can be found here:

https://easyzoom.com/image/122425

In order to accommodate both versions using a free account I had to re upload the previous map again so it has a new URL:

https://easyzoom.com/image/122424

I've updated the link in the old post as well, but if you have it bookmarked you need to update the link. 

Its time for a short recap and update. Its been a month since the refocus of my Patreon, and thanks you your support there are now more of you supporting me and I receive more comments and emails that before, way more. Thank you all for your continued support, and to all of you new patrons welcome aboard this journey in mapping a fantasy world!

The past months have been mostly about getting my Greyhawk mapping project up to speed again. Its been in a semi dormant state while I worked almost exclusively on other things  for the past couple of years, with plenty of things left hanging. A 2017 Edition of my Flanaess map has been made into, PDF, JPG and Online format. The goal with the 2017 Edition was to publish a number of small corrections that I've done the past two years. The 2018 Edition is way more ambitious laying the ground work for future updates. 

June was mostly devoted to housekeeping, getting old stuff done, this month will be mostly about ground work for the future. 

I will mainly work on two different things. Wrapping up my World Machine series of videos with new videos that are in the making. The video's will be available for Cartography Patrons during the course of the month. 

We need a style template for the 2018 Edition, some of the existing text and symbols doesn't look that great to be honest. With the updated terrain adjustments will be needed, but have to be made with an eye on what is practical. This is work that has to live for only a few years, gradually being replaced with a new content during the next five or so years. Just like with the terrain update one of the main goals is to make it a bit more compatible with future content. So expect me to post ideas here for you guys to comment on, I need your critical eyes to improve things!

There are some more heraldry and other tidbits to do as well, keeping me busy until I go to Gen Con by the end of this month. Those of you who attend Gen con, I would love to meet up and say thank you for helping me do this. Most of my time at the con I will spent at the Lone Wolf Development booth 343 in the Exhibit Hall. 

August will be shifting perspectives going super large with a first session of Oerth Mapping and getting a first area ready for the 2018 Edition roll out. I have some extra secret projects that I will tell you about when I know enough to get them under way. Thank you again for supporting me!  

Here is my full Campaign map for download in JPG and PDF format. It is the same map as the "official" but with lots of additional settlements and other features including heraldry.

I will present some of the locations and backstories with notes and here later, in the man time you can get the maps here:

PDF: https://www.dropbox.com/s/i1mpvwwl5it93tv/Flanaess%20Campaign%20map180329.pdf?dl=0

JPG:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/ebi2jj05k5v9wmh/Flanaess%20Campaign%20Map180329.jpg?dl=0

Here are the next bunch of heraldry updates. I'm doing them in Alphabetical order so they are from all over, including a couple of MeyerHawk shields from my own campaign. 

Wow we just passed 100 patrons, thank you everyone who have choose to support me in doing this, you just made me one happy mapper!!

This means that from now on what used to be my hobby, to map the world of Greyhawk is now something I can devote time to on a regular basis, at least a day a week and often more, and my work days tend to be 10 or even 12 hour especially when I'm working on things I'm passionate about 🙂

Currently I'm working on the re-editing of the Flanaess terrain, which is about a third done. Color and brightness adjustment are done on a global and regional level, things like the overly blue oceans, the over the top greenery of most things green. So now the lands have a much more natural general look.

Next step will be to work on the wet parts of the map, starting with the ocean (and big lake) depths to try and convey depth information in a way that is subtle, realistic but still informative. The its time to work on the shallow waters, things like coral reefs, beaches, coastal marshlands etc, both salty and fresh.  The final wet parts to to go over are the rivers and inland wetlands.

The final bit is to adjust details here and there. Try and fix some of the"ugly bits" that have been irritating me for a long time. Things like artifacts from the stitching together of the tiny bits of terrain that came out of Bryce, and valleys that should have a bit more erosion.

Heraldry is another part of fantasy mapping I love to do, and there are a few shields that needs a work over, and I have some new ones in the making as well. The new ones are from Dungeon and Dragon magazine and are from the World of Greyhawk so they deserve to be part of the effort.

I also need to do more videos! My series of the basics of World Machine have one left, how to export stuff. Then there are some advanced WM stuff to cover and a whole new series on terrain editing in Photoshop.

There are a lot of software development in the area of terrain generation and cartography, both in general and directly related to fantasy and role playing. This is something I'm very interested in and I intend to write about and review what I see as interesting.

I wrote a couple of blog posts about this a few years ago, time to pick up that thread and look back and see how wrong I was and continue the series with additional writing.

The new generation of Greyhawk (or Oerth even) Cartography is not forgotten, it is in the concept phase and will be presented in various posts this year.

I'm a little hesitant to actually start mapping until I have had a chance to test out the new tool Gaea in its release form, coming this summer. I've been tinkering with the beta for some time, but it is still missing, some for me, key features. Once these features are at least in beta its time to start the actual mapping. 

This means a bit more time on projections and determining where on Oerth Flanaess is and a bit more about its surroundings. If there are more time over there are things like historic maps, trade, economy and other things we can give some love to as well.

The money from my Patreon will in the next few months go to my GIS fund, to give me the resources to get a set of professional GIS tools. With them and some time to learn how to use them will evolve my cartography to a whole new level, especially the presentation and usability of my the material I'm producing. Over time it will also speed up things.

There are two areas I want to improve over the next few years, presentation and small scale mapping. On the presentation side of things I want to improve my web based maps and the use of game engines. With Small Scale Mapping I mean things like city mapping, encounter maps and dungeon maps.    

Some of my dream projects that are on my list to map before I die are, the City of Greyhawk, the Underdark and iconic places of the Planes. Each of them are an enormous challenge to do right and make them both useful in your gaming and show them off in a way that show their true character.

This is what I strive for and thanks to you guys I'm in a position to do this, thank all so much!!!